When we have an active community of the faithful who continually seek to listen as they are addressed by Christ, they will hear the call to go out as Christ went out and offer healing to those who come to them. They will do so not as workers of magic or arrogant possessors of power but as the humiliated Christ did in the form of service to others.

At times they will hear a call to live God’s reconciling love and at other times to protest the destructive conditions of the society around them. They will cure the sick, name and cast out demons and announce the nearness of the reign of God to which others can also choose to be obedient. And when they return to the community, they will be willing to lift up in praise the wonders of what God has done through them. (Luke 10:17-20)

Recently I was in the state of Chiapas in Mexico. The Presbyterian Church is growing at a rapid pace in that state. The state is densly populated by indigenous tribes who have felt largely neglected by both the state and the church in the past. When the Mexican Presbyterians began to offer the gospel to them and pay attention to their needs as a people, it enobled them. They felt the power of God’s love addressing them and they began to flock to the church. They were experiencing an alternate world to the degrading one that they were used to and it was experienced as good news.